


Monsters

by Sapphylicious



Series: Long Way Down [1]
Category: Kuroko no Basuke | Kuroko's Basketball
Genre: Alternate Universe - Supernatural, Gen, Magic, Vampires
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-02-04
Updated: 2013-02-04
Packaged: 2017-11-28 04:15:33
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 2
Words: 14,973
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/670160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Sapphylicious/pseuds/Sapphylicious
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Aomine Daiki. Age 19. High school dropout. Hunter of all things that go bump in the night.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. when monsters come out to play

**Author's Note:**

> Hello! If you've read this story on Livejournal, it's pretty much the same—I've just made some minor edits and reorganized the format so everything is divided into story arcs as part of a series, as opposed to a single multi-chapter work.

Anima was a bust tonight.

The subterranean nightclub, advertised mainly by word of mouth, was tucked away in one of the many back alley niches of Shibuya, easy to miss unless one knew exactly where to find it. The club's sign was small and unobtrusive, swallowed up in the bright neon of the district at night. It was little more than an unlit arrow pointing down to the narrow stair leading to the entrance, and there was almost never a line. Cover charge was cheap, no discounts, and didn't include drinks. IDs were checked for 20 and over, but a decent fake could get you in the door.

Going belowground revealed an iceberg effect; the place was bigger than the dingy topside suggested, the spacious dance floor always packed, masses of bodies moving to the heavy thump-thump-thump of electronic beats. The crowd skewed young, trendy, and local—neither a salaryman nor a foreigner in sight. Most were dressed to impress, cruising for hookups, and the club was located conveniently next to Love Hotel Hill.

Anima was his favorite place to unwind—but not tonight, it seemed. Aomine couldn't pinpoint why that was; maybe the DJ sucked, maybe the girls weren't as hot, or maybe he just wasn't drunk enough. One Asahi couldn't be expected to do much for him. Two might not even be worth it, and he was strapped for cash this week. Momoi kept pestering him for new materials, but the prey didn't crawl out of their holes at his convenience.

What didn't help was that last month he'd done a particularly bang-up job cleaning out a harpy nest, and since then all of Tokyo's fearsome, fanged horrors had been nice and quiet. Not a peep out of them, and while most modern monstrosities weren't willing to stick their necks out under normal circumstances, there were usually a few troublemakers to be found for entertainment and profit.

He was fucking bored, that was the problem. The money was useful, sure—and what the hell was Momoi doing, asking him for new stuff when she had enough harpy feathers to last a lifetime? Even if she botched every single one of her spells, she couldn't have used them all up already.

"Another?"

"Nah, I'm done." Aomine waved off the bartender and gave the room another passing sweep, but nothing in the crowd caught his eye. Just your usual 20-somethings dancing the night away, getting drunk and hopefully getting laid. Booze and sex were the height of excitement for them. One or two might up the ante with a more illegal kind of vice, but none were probably looking for a good knock-down, drag-out fight with high stakes, life on the line, kill-or-be-killed consequences. Now _that_ was a way to get the blood and adrenaline pumping.

And that was how Aomine found himself walking out of the club as early as one o'clock. He'd barely been there for an hour—a waste of his yen, even if the entrance fee was cheap. Shoving his hands into his empty pockets, he stalked through the narrow, twisting corridors of Shibuya's less-traveled streets. Surely there was something out there at this time of night. Something ferocious and nasty, daring enough to show its face, and unfortunate enough to cross his path.

#

Nothing. Not a damn thing.

His wanderings had taken him out of Shibuya and onto wider streets, though there wasn't much in the way of pedestrian traffic as he left the entertainment district behind. Maybe he'd make his way to Roppongi where there were a number of seedy pockets to poke around in—except that was in the complete opposite direction, and the trains had long since stopped running. When Aomine checked the display of his phone the clock read 2:16. The night wasn't young anymore, but dawn was still a ways off, and he didn't have anything else to do.

He stared hard at the screen, briefly conflicted, then made up his mind and pulled up his contacts list to dial a number. The phone rang several times before someone picked up.

"You know," said Imayoshi, his Kansai-ben drawl annoyingly lucid despite what had to have been a rude awakening, "if this came from anybody else at this time of night, I'd assume they were in mortal peril."

"You get a lot of late-night distress calls?" Given the business Imayoshi was involved in, it wasn't beyond the realm of possibility, though the caller would have to be either brave or stupid. Or Aomine.

"None, in fact." Forget pleasant, Imayoshi's tone was downright cheery.

"…Didn't figure you for the type to value his beauty sleep."

"Nor would I have pegged you as the sort for social calls. What do you want, Aomine?"

Chain links rattled as he slouched against a fence, illuminated under a lone street light. "I've got time to kill. Got any tips?"

"Ah, I see." Imayoshi's tone was enlightened, as if he hadn't guessed what this was about from the start. "You want trade secrets for free. How enterprising of you."

Aomine scowled, reminded of why he hadn't wanted to make this call. Imayoshi's irritating personality wasn't something that yielded to an assault of temper, and Aomine's attitude wasn't inclined to work around someone else's whims. He'd have preferred to lean on Sakurai instead, always an easy target, but either the little twerp had grown enough of a backbone to block Aomine's calls or someone had changed his number (the latter was more likely). It was only a matter of time before Aomine found out what the new one was. Until then, though, he was stuck with this conniving bastard. "Come on," Aomine tried, his attempt at compromise more of a whine than a wheedle, "I'll even take small fry, you can keep the big game. I'm that bored."

Imayoshi made a sympathetic sound. "I'm afraid I can't help you."

Aomine envisioned his mocking expression. Then he envisioned punching Imayoshi in the face, knocking his glasses right off. It wasn't satisfying enough. His hand twisted in the metal links of the fence, making them creak in protest. "Don't bullshit me. That fancy network of yours has to be good for something."

"Regretfully, even the guild resources have been coming up short as of late. Word has it that a number of marks have fled the city ever since a _certain individual_ single-handedly annihilated the Pikros Clan in Aoyama. That incident upset marks in all the neighboring wards and then some. So, if you'd like I could connect you to our Osaka branch…"

"What are you, a phone operator?"

"I'm merely trying to help a fellow professional, going out of my way to offer exclusive—and if I may say, top-of-the-line—guild resources to an independent."

"You sound like a con artist."

"Now, now, there's no need for names. I'm only suggesting that a talented—and as you said, bored—young hunter such as yourself might find worthy challenges elsewhere. For example, Kyoto's colorful history makes it a popular haunt for the local demons. Or if you prefer the exotic, might I recommend a trip to Okinawa? There are always strange things to be found on the Ryuukyuu islands. How about abroad to the U.S.?"

"Nice try," Aomine said with a sneer that went unappreciated by the deserted sidewalk. "But I don't need a travel agent."

"Pity." Imayoshi sounded sincere—and he probably was. The guild didn't like competition and Aomine wasn't interested in entering the fold, though they'd had mutually beneficial arrangements in the past and would surely have more in the future.

Until, perhaps, they decided to force him out of the picture by whatever means necessary. Well, they could try. Aomine would appreciate a new type of challenge. "So, what, is that it?"

A sigh gusted through the phone line. "That would be the extent of things, yes."

He had to be lying. No way there was _nothing_ , but Aomine grudgingly admitted his point about the fleeing prey was legitimate, in which case the guild would preserve its information to keep the profits for itself. "Fine," he bit off. "If something comes up, let me know. Or don't, and I'll beat you bastards to it anyway." He hung up without waiting for a reply.

Begging the guild for scraps had been his dead-last option. Aomine pushed off the fence and gave it a swift kick, making the interlaced wires bounce. Beyond them lay an empty, half-shadowed basketball court, hemmed in by the surrounding buildings.

He was scaling the fence before he knew what he was doing. There was a gate, but it was probably locked, and then he was swinging his leg over the top and dropping to the ground on the other side. Nostalgia kicked up in the air like dust, itchy and irritating. No warm glow to be found here, and besides which, the place was a wreck.

The space was oddly cramped, and it wasn't just because of the looming walls on either side. More like the dimensions and measurements themselves were off, maybe sketched in as an afterthought by an amateur who decided to spruce up a plain old abandoned lot. Whatever the case, the current state of the place was pitiful and reeked of neglect. There were no lights aside from what spilled over from the sidewalk, but from what he could see the walls were slathered in graffiti and the lines of the court were faded nearly invisible. The two looming backboards were splotched with rust, chain nets dangling from their hoops.

Standing there in the middle of the desolate court, Aomine couldn't say why he'd jumped that fence. There was no ball, nothing for him to do, and the sights were familiar and foreign at the same time. Not quite the same as it had been in junior high, but then, nothing was the same. Everything had changed at the start of high school when Momoi discovered her boyfriend was cheating on her.

#

"What am I supposed to do, beat him up or something?" A steady rhythm of bouncing rubber echoed in the gym as Aomine dribbled the ball. The act was as mindless as breathing to him. Games were like that now, too, just a set of motions to go through over and over, offering little reward. Even the disappointment was growing stale. Needless to say, the club at least had been pleased to have him, and his spot with the regulars was already secured. His reputation preceded him. What a pain. "Eh, sounds troublesome. Don't wanna."

Momoi pouted from the bench, fiddling with her braid. As soon as she found some flaw with it she began the process of unraveling and rebraiding, having already gone through this pattern multiple times as she chattered on about her soon-to-be-ex. "Well, fine. Besides, I'd rather you didn't, if only because it'd give people the wrong idea." She winced delicately at the very thought.

"Tch. Like I care." He shot one-handed, barely looking, and heard the swish of the net followed by the thwack of the ball hitting the floor.

"He's not worth it, anyway." She spoke softly before falling silent, a gap of interrupting stillness halting the conversation as she retied the band to the end of her braid. A decisive flick sent it back over her shoulder. Then she flexed her long legs, visibly gathering herself, and sprang up from the bench in a more buoyant mood, face beaming. "Hey, want to get ice cream on the way home?"

In lieu of reply Aomine scooped the ball up and flung it at her.

Momoi caught it, just barely, with a surprised flinch. "Hey!" Trembling, she threw the ball to the side where it bounced into a corner and was promptly forgotten. "What the hell was that for?" An irate flush had risen to her cheeks, clashing with her hair, and her glossed lips skimmed back in a snarl.

Aomine regarded her with casual indifference, observing offhandedly, "Geez, you're ugly when you're mad." But between this and the fixed smile pasted on her face moments before, the splotchy anger was preferable. He rolled his shoulders and extended his arms in a lazy stretch. "Ah, I'm bored already. I'm going to take a nap."

"You're awful, not to mention hopeless," Momoi declared like this was anything new, arms crossed over her sizable chest. Aomine gave her a backwards wave as he passed her by. Before he walked too far she pitched her voice to yell, "Don't skip practice tomorrow! Stupid Dai-chan!"

Heh. Same old Momoi Satsuki.

He made an appearance at practice the next day after all. He'd be bored if he skipped, too, so might as well change things up every once in a while. But as expected, he walked out as soon as the novelty of everyone's nervous confusion wore off. Momoi shouted and called him names, he insulted her back; business as usual. The Inter-High was approaching and she would soon be too busy with her intelligence-gathering and analyses to mope over cheating boyfriends. A fine thing as far as Aomine was concerned since he was sick of hearing her talk about it. She was supposed to have girlfriends for that sort of, "there, there, he doesn't deserve you," drivel.

Intending to sleep through the rest of practice on the school roof, by the time he opened his eyes again the skyline was a burnt orange seeping below the horizon, taking the heat of the day with it. "Ow," he said, sitting up stiffly and working the kinks out of his neck.

There was a message on his phone from Momoi inviting him over for dinner with her family, which she always did without fail when his dad was away on a long haul trip. Even if he was fighting with her over one thing or another, she would still march on over to his apartment a couple floors down to extend the offer with a stubborn, accusing glare. At first she was probably put up to it by her soft-hearted mom. Now it was more of a habit, much like the rest of their friendship.

He started to type a reply, but then deleted it and closed his phone. It was too late to make it there on time, but he could stop by for leftovers after. Wouldn't be unusual. He had his own habits.

He was getting awfully hungry though, stomach growling as he passed food stalls that were filling up with salarymen as they poured out of their offices. "Damnit," he muttered, too broke for even a snack. The last of his spending money had been blown at the arcade yesterday. 

It was long-shot, but Aomine kept an eye out for familiar faces in the evening crowd. No telling when one might run into "friend" who could be persuaded into treating a guy to some yakitori.

That was when he saw them. Head turning, Aomine zeroed in on a couple emerging from the cinema, arm in arm. The guy wore Touou's uniform, a first year if Aomine remembered correctly; he'd heard all about him, first with effusive praise and more recently with numb dejection. Supposedly he was the studious type, but what kind of nerd went on dates in the middle of the week? The girl was from another school. Not as stacked as Momoi, but that couldn't be held against her, and she was pretty in the face. As Aomine watched, the infamous ex bent to say something in the girl's ear, making her smile and nod, and off they went.

Aomine snorted. _What a sack of crap. Satsuki's taste sucks._

He made to continue on his way, but after a few steps came to a stop. His appetite wasn't clamoring anymore after witnessing such an unpleasant sight. Though, on the contrary, he suddenly felt energetic. Inspired, even. The corners of his mouth curled up in an anticipatory grin. Aomine hadn't been raised a complete animal, and manners dictated that he thank the person responsible for such a turn. He turned and stalked after the couple to do just that.

It wasn't long before they cut through the park where the late hour meant thin crowds. How cozy and romantic. They even went off the path towards a thoroughly deserted area, which suited Aomine just fine as he ambled after them without bothering to be sneaky.

Not noticing him yet, the girl's steps faltered, a frown crossing her face while a whine crept into her tone. "Where are we going? I thought you said you were hungry."

"I still am," the ex said, reeling her in so they were mostly hidden behind a tree. The girl giggled, accepting this change of plans.

Aomine rolled his eyes. "Hate to interrupt," he said, hands in his pockets with his school bag tucked under one arm. The girl let out a surprised yelp and the guy glared distastefully, although he did a slight double-take when he had to adjust his glare up. He opened his mouth but Aomine talked over him. "You're Nakayama from 1-B, right? Or is it Yamanaka... shit, can't remember." Most of Momoi's rambling had gone in one ear and out the other, passing through a very loose sieve. The stray details that remained were the exceptions rather than the rule. Plus, it wasn't as though they'd been introduced. Momoi had long since stopped inviting Aomine to meet her other friends or boyfriends. If he didn't blow her off it always ended in disaster.

"Can I help you?" Yamanaka kept an arm slung around the increasingly annoyed girl, who apparently didn't like being manhandled in front of an audience. His bony fingers dug into her arm and she winced.

"Sure," Aomine said, grin ratcheting across his features while trying to recall any signs of bruises on Momoi's skin. Surely he'd have noticed something like that. "Just one thing."

It took less than a second for him to move; one moment he was standing a reasonable distance away and a blink later he was practically on top of them. He ignored the recoiling girl whose mouth split open in a shriek as his arm sailed past her eyes, balled-up fist crunching into Nakayama's nose with a wet, red eruption.

Yamanaka-or-Nakayama let out a guttural cry, hands flying up to cover his dripping face. Once free and forgotten, the girl beat a hasty retreat and tore out of the park.

Aomine flexed his hand, knuckles throbbing in a satisfying way. "That's all," he drawled, and contemplated the blood smeared on his skin before wiping it off on his pant leg. Touou's dark uniform served well in that regard.

But now the fun was over. Maybe he'd been too hasty, downing the opponent right away like that. Usually he could wait a bit and coast to the inevitable conclusion, but he'd been simmering already and once warmed up Aomine didn't know how to go slow. 

He was starting to leave when coherency trickled out of the ex's snarling curses. "Did Momoi put you up to this? That bitch, I should have—"

"Hey." Aomine turned just enough to gave him the corner of one sardonic eye and the hint of bared teeth. "Do I look like I take orders from her? Satsuki said you're not worth it. I decided on my own I didn't like your face, so I took it upon myself to rearrange it a little. Besides," Aomine's smile was scimitar-thin and keenly edged, "scum like you doesn't deserve her."

Yamanaka-or-Nakayama breathed harshly through his blood-smeared mouth. His nose was a pulpy ruin that marred his otherwise good looks. He'd have trouble picking up girls with that makeover, made uglier when his violence-laden features contorted in a pained sneer. "And you do, I take it?"

Aomine blinked once, slowly. "…Hah?" A snigger tickled its way up his throat. When it emerged it was a full-bodied laugh, shaking his frame in relentless waves. "What, jealous?" He laughed some more, picturing Momoi's chagrined face at the very idea, and had to wipe tears from his eyes before regaining what was left of his composure. "Well, whatever. Think what you want. Pfft."

"You…"

"What, you want more? I'm busy, dinner's waiting!"

"Coincidentally," Yamanaka-or-Nakayama said in an eerily calm tone, "so is mine."

Quicker than Aomine would have given him credit for, he struck out and grabbed Aomine's wrist. Aomine dug his heels in out of reflex, but—unbelievably—a single tug pulled him off his feet and sent him sprawling face-first into the tree. "What—" A hand twisted in his hair, yanking at the scalp. "—fuck." His forehead slammed into the trunk. The tree shuddered, loose pieces of bark flaking off around him, and pain reverberated through his skull.

"…not what I'd have preferred, but I'm not terribly picky…" Fabric rustled, then tore. Aomine felt something gust across his neck where his collar gaped open.

_Oh, hell, no._ His elbow snapped back of its own accord, catching the creep square in the ribs. Aomine levered the weight off his back and he spun to face his opponent—except spinning was a bad idea, because the world didn't stop moving even when his body did. He barely managed to brace himself before Yamanaka-or-Nakayama charged in with implausible speed, mouth open and full of teeth.

Full of elongated, pointy teeth.

Eyes wide despite the blood seeping around them from his scraped-up face, Aomine moved on autopilot. He dodged. He punched. He landed a few hits, but the thing that Yamanaka-or-Nakayama had become shook off the blows and kept coming, like something out of a movie. Or that American TV show with the hot blonde chick who hunted vampires.

Vampires.

"Are you fucking kidding me?"

That night, everything changed.

#

Vampires weren't the only things out there, of course. The world teemed with all manner of fantastical beasts, demons, and phenomena; impossibly diverse, bound only by their essence of "otherness" that put them at odds with humankind since time immemorial. These otherworld entities stretched the limits of the imagination. There were enough of them to fill compendiums, even entire libraries. Momoi kept her supernatural encyclopedias right next to her university textbooks on education and humanities, and her spellbooks were piled among beauty and fashion magazines.

As for Aomine, book-learning had never been his forte, but he did have an unusual collection of weaponry accumulated at home. He preferred modern fare since those worked well enough in most cases; no need to get fancy when a point blank lead slug could do the job as well as a willow wand soaked in the light of a full moon (not to mention he felt a lot less like Harry Potter gone wrong with a Sig Sauer P226 in hand). However, necessity dictated that he also hoarded a number of esoteric relics for the rare occasion that required a more mystical touch.

Most healthy young men hid stashes of porn under their beds. Aomine was no exception, but his stash also included his P226, a box of regular .40 S&W rounds, another box of same-caliber silver-filled hollowpoints, and an ancient Persian sword with a name he couldn't pronounce to save his life (fortunately, the name didn't matter so long as it did as advertised and warded off magic).

Aomine let out a heavy sigh, tired all of a sudden, and not looking forward to the long walk back to the apartment he shared with his roommate. Maybe he could see how far his remaining cash could get him via cab…

Reminiscence had rendered his senses hazy; it took a precious few seconds for him to tear through the gauze and react to the sound of scuffed pavement. There'd been no approach, just the faintest noise from behind. A switchblade appeared in his hand, blade snapping out and locking in place with the press of a button, its sharp, serrated edge mirroring the dangerous line of Aomine's mouth.

"Come on out," he invited, scanning the shadows under the far building. Nothing moved from within their depths. "What, is that it?" Disappointment was only skin-deep when the hairs on the back of his neck were still standing up.

He detected a soft release of breath—there, to the side—knife up and ready, body coiled for an explosion of movement—

—only to freeze, seeing nothing—

"Is this better?"

Aomine spun in almost a full circle, stopping to face the fence and the sidewalk. There, at last, was the culprit, standing under the wash of light that partially flooded the court. Teenaged male in a sleeveless hoodie and shorts, on the small side (like that meant anything), pale to the point of colorless, and poker-faced even when Aomine made an irritated slashing motion with the knife.

"Is what better? And where the hell did you come from?"

"I thought the light would make it easier to see. I've been here the whole time."

"Bullshit."

"No, it's the truth."

"That can't be—" But Aomine was already lowering his blade. The initial rush was gone, and absolutely nothing about the kid indicated threat. Rather, he looked like he might fade away with a strong breeze. If it was a trick, it was a damn good one. "Hey. You're not a ghost or anything, right?" That was one phenomenon he hadn't encountered yet, though that fussy sorcerer buddy of Momoi's claimed they existed. As far as Aomine was concerned, if it he couldn't kill it he didn't care. He was a hunter, not an exorcist.

"I'm not a ghost."

"Hn. Don't tell me you're human." Aomine's eyes narrowed.

The boy's stare never wavered. "…No."

They stood like that for a drawn-out minute, with Aomine casually toying with his knife. The boy hardly seemed to notice it, but that was good. Maybe. Smart enough to pay attention to the person without being distracted by the weapon, or just brave to the point of stupidity? …Whatever, no use thinking in circles. "I can't tell if you're interesting or boring."

"Probably boring. At least compared to you."

"What about me?"

Pale brows lifted in a mild, but frank expression. It was the first time he'd shown any kind of expression at all. "You're famous. Or infamous, depending. The whole country is talking about you."

Aomine's laugh was short and barbed, with the hooks turned inward. "So I'm a celebrity now? Geez." He folded his knife with a decisive click and returned it to his pocket.

Now the boy looked quizzical, or close to it. "You're not going to attack?"

…The hell? "You just admitted you were boring! Do you _want_ to fight? 'Cause I'd be happy to!"

"Not particularly."

Aomine stalked up to the kid and twisted a handful of his t-shirt, backing him none-too-gently into the fence. Chain links bounced and dipped under the pressure. "Are you messing with me?" His threatening snarl was met with unflinching blankness.

"Not at all. Are you going to kill me because I'm not human?"

"Well, it's in the job description." No telling what might be hidden behind those big, guileless eyes. Demonkind ran the gamut from dumb as bricks to superbly deceptive, and no hunter got very far without erring on the side of caution. Aomine tightened his grip. The boy, whatever he was, didn't weigh all that much. He had some muscle definition in his arms, and he wasn't precisely a waif, but Aomine towered over him with ease. He wasn't putting up even a token fight.

The knife in Aomine's pocket had a blade just shy of four inches—enough to pierce the heart if his aim was just right, which took care of a lot of creatures. He knew from unpleasant experience that sawing off the head also tended to work. A mere stab to the skull might slow something down, but couldn't be counted on for a sure kill unless you really obliterated the gray matter. Burning was effective, but only if it was thorough and fast.

And those were only the methods that covered the most ground.

"Hey. You're not something weird and hard to kill—like, invulnerable to all weapons but for the one cursed dagger you keep in your safe deposit box—are you? Because that's such a pain I don't even feel like bothering."

"Nope. Garden variety vampire. One stab to the heart and I'm dust."

"That so?" The seconds marched on by. Aomine drew in a breath. "Then do you have a death wish or something?"

"Not particularly, no."

Aomine relaxed his hold and the kid slid down to stand comfortably on the pavement again. "Shit, you really are boring."

The vampire gazed up at him, uncaringly rumpled. "You're not as bad as I'd heard."

"You've barely known me for five minutes and I almost killed you. I seriously thought about it." Pause. "...What have you heard?"

The boy readily counted off on his fingers. "That you're a monster in human skin, that you've started a one-man genocidal campaign against us, that you're the bogeyman the actual bogeymen tell bedtime stories about..."

"You made that last one up."

"No, it's the truth."

"Huh." Aomine had to look away from the boy's solemn face, embarrassed somehow by the dramatic turn his reputation had taken. So he'd staked a few vamps, banished a couple of demons, and sent the local small fry packing—suddenly he was the otherworld's own version of Hitler. "Well, damn."

"These things do tend to get blown out of proportion," the boy agreed.

Aomine clicked his tongue and scrubbed at the back of his head. "Ah, whatever. Listen, kid—"

"I'm not a kid." There was a stubborn firmness to the set of his mouth, and it was true that vampires, once turned, stopped aging. From the looks of him he was 15 or thereabouts, but he could very well be over a hundred.

"Fine, but I hope you don't expect me to treat you like an elder."

He shook his head. "No need for that. I'm Kuroko."

"Kuroko, huh." Was he seriously making small talk with a vampire? "I guess you already know my name." Apparently that's what he was doing. Well, it was entertaining in its way.

"Nice to meet you." Despite the belatedness, Kuroko dipped in a perfunctory bow. He was easily the most polite vampire Aomine had ever met. Not that any of the other vampires he'd met had time for pleasantries—kind of hard to talk when you were crumbling into dust.

"Same here."

"Please move out of the way."

Aomine's mouth had barely begun to shape around the word "what" when a shriek of metal pierced the air. He wasted no time throwing himself to the side, hitting the pavement at the same time as the nearby basketball stand came crashing down. His body rolled, and then he was springing up to his feet with his knife in hand, blade flicked out, alert eyes scanning through the debris.

Kuroko was nowhere in sight—

"There, by the backboard."

"Son of a bitch!" Aomine's arm jerked as he aborted the stabbing motion he'd started to make at the sound of that soft voice. "Don't _do_ that if you don't want to get shanked!"

"Careful," Kuroko advised, unconcerned and unapologetic that he was a walking heart risk. "It's on the move again."

"It" was a shivering mass huddled near the fallen basket, dark save for pale, gleaming patches. Whatever it was stretched upward—it was standing, having folded in on itself presumably from the fall, and now Aomine could make out a tall, person-shaped figure clothed in trousers and a long coat despite the warm season. Its hands and feet were bare, flesh-colored but waxy, and they flopped around as the body wobbled to and fro like some boneless thing. The face… well, it didn't really have a face, just a bumpy canvas of shiny skin that turned unmistakably in his direction.

Aomine's pulse kicked up several notches in the span of a breath. The taste of electricity permeated the air, either magic or adrenaline but it didn't matter which. "Well, well." He lowered his stance, loose rather than tense, ready to flow into action at a moment's notice. "Which hell did this nightmare crawl out of?"

"It's a homunculus," Kuroko said. He recited as if reading from an encyclopedia: "Artificial life created by powerful magic, and more advanced than golems. They move only according to their master's will."

"Am I writing a paper? Just tell me if there's anything I should know before I kill it."

"That depends on how it's receiving its magical input. The energy could be stored like a battery, or there might be a direct connection…"

"What the fuck does that even—"

The homunculus lunged. At a glance it was ungainly, even clumsy, barely managing to keep itself upright. Its shape was human only in the loosest of terms. A failed experiment; surely no sorcerer would claim this pathetic sight was a magnificent success.

But the way it moved made no sense, bending an arm in a way that no arm was meant bend and releasing like a coiled spring. Unprepared, it was all Aomine could do to get out of the way, buffeted by the pressure of the heavy limb blowing past. His knife hand darted in as an afterthought, edge skimming a line from wrist to elbow through the sleeve, but all that did was open a shallow wound that didn't have the decency bleed. To add insult to injury, his blade came away smudged with clingy bits of pink putty.

This would teach him not to leave home without a gun. _At least_. What he could really use was a can of aerosol and a lighter.

"Homunculi don't feel pain," Kuroko informed helpfully.

"Thanks for nothing!"

"Its master's mark should be somewhere on the body. Destroying that will disrupt the magic." _So there_ , his tone implied.

Aomine brandished the knife again, this time to block the outspread hand zooming for his head. Steel cleaved deep between bloodless fingers, splitting them down the middle, and the creature's momentum continued to carry it forward. Aomine ducked under the body, jerking his blade down then up to sink into its clothed chest where a normal person's heart beat. But the homunculus had no blood to pump, and no lungs to fill with air, so stabbing it was like stabbing a hunk of dead meat. Aomine reinforced his grip with both hands and carved a gash partway down its torso before the club-like weight of an arm came down on the base of his neck.

He dropped with a burst of stars filling his vision but had no time to be dazed. Sensing rather than seeing, he rolled away to avoid getting curb-stomped and pushed himself off the gritty pavement. With both palms flat on the ground, that was when Aomine realized he was empty-handed. He looked up, spitting curses, to find his knife stuck and quivering in the homunculus's abdomen.

"So this mark," Aomine began, having to pause in order to duck another swing. The creature's split hand whipped through the air like a flail. "Any idea where it could be?"

"Not a clue."

"You—!" His glare caught on something lying on the court—the fallen wreckage of the basketball stand.

He waited until the homunculus charged again, made a clean dodge of its writhing bulk, and sprinted for the debris in hope of finding something to use. The stand itself was a heavy shaft of metal, twisted and ruptured at the base but not broken off completely. The backboard was still stuck fast to it as well. Aomine planted his foot on the rim of the hoop, applied pressure, and it lowered with a brittle creak. A little more of his weight made the ring snap. He snatched it up, rusted chains and all—as a weapon it wasn't much, but better than bare hands.

Now to find the sorcerer's mark. Aomine eyed the homunculus from head to toe and grimaced. Easier said than done. His bisection of its chest hadn't done anything, and the rest of its body was still covered. For all he knew he could be looking for something the size of a dot on its ass.

He had his tried-and-true fallback plan, though: pulverize the shit out of everything until it was dead.

A grin crept onto his face as he dove in, band of metal thrust out and catching the homunculus in the kneecap. There wasn't much to crack there—no bone at any rate, but something stiff that passed for a skeleton buckled under the blow. The monster lost its balance and toppled. Aomine whacked away a flailing limb, then brought the hoop down hard and precise on a shoulder joint for another muffled crunch. Having no mouth and feeling no pain, all the homunculus could do was struggle.

There was something odd, though. Aomine couldn't put his finger on it, but didn't have the luxury to ponder when the smooth, round surface of the homunculus's head suddenly butted right under his chin, making his teeth click together. Its skull was tougher than the rest of it, like solid rubber, and Aomine reeled backward.

One hand clamped over his aching jaw, the other held fast to the hoop. "Shit," he ground out, then stared in consternation as the homunculus lumbered back on its feet. The front of its coat was in tatters from his previous slice, but the skin peeking out underneath was unbroken and good as new. So, too, was the hand that had been split, its flesh joined seamlessly once more. "Oh, that's just _balls_." Then, to Kuroko, "You could have warned me!"

Kuroko didn't even blink. His eyes were distant and he sounded distracted. "That was fast…"

The homunculus lolled its head this way and that. It turned away, but only shuffled a few paces towards the basketball stand. A very bad feeling churned in Aomine's gut.

"Hey. Does that mean…?"

"You should stay back."

But Aomine paid Kuroko no mind and ran in, swiping at the homunculus with the sharp edge of the hoop where the metal had torn from the backboard. At the same time the stand was wrenched free of its mooring. Aomine flipped the hoop over the homunculus's head, tightened the net into a makeshift choke chain, and clung to the creature's back where he was out of the way of the wildly swinging pole.

It was an unexpectedly efficient monster, dropping the shaft with a hollow clang and reaching to peel Aomine from its back.

"Damnit…!"

"Aomine-kun, catch!"

"I'm kind of busy here!" Nonetheless, he freed one hand just as something small smacked into the middle of his palm. "Eh?" His fingers closed around the familiar handle of his retracted knife. "When—?"

"The left shoulder, please cut there!"

Aomine didn't give pause. A flick of the button released the blade, still coated with a fleshy film, and he reversed his grip on the handle to stab downward, hilt-deep. He dragged the blade diagonally, then withdrew it and sunk it in again, cutting an X across the whole shoulder.

Beneath him, the large body shuddered violently. Aomine had the distinct impression that if possible, the homunculus would be screaming. As it was, the thing heaved and finally dislodged the hunter from its back, and Aomine's knife slid out with a streak of red along the blade.

The homunculus continued to convulse, from all appearances in the throes of agony despite what Kuroko claimed about its inability to feel. Aomine kept a wary eye on it as the moments dragged on.

"Do they always take this long to die?"

"I'm not sure."

Aomine's grip on his knife tightened and he redirected his glare. 

"The flow of magic has been cut off, although it may have some stored up to keep functioning for a while… ah, no. It's losing power now."

True enough, the seizures were lessening into mere twitches, and then as Aomine watched in disgust the flesh began to disintegrate. Not into dust like a vampire, but a quasi-liquid goop that slowly formed a puddle around the shrinking body. The dark clothes sunk inward as the physical form collapsed. Positive that there wasn't enough of an arm to clock him anymore, he bent down to wipe his blade off on a dry edge of the coat before it was submersed in the slime.

"I'm sorry."

Aomine tilted his head up, brow arched. "You got something to be sorry about?"

"I couldn't figure out where the mark was until then. That's why."

He held Kuroko's gaze for a beat, noting the fine line of concern wrinkling the vampire's pale brow. He was a weird one. _Garden variety, my ass._ "From where I stand, you helped me out. I couldn't tell where it was at all."

"You almost got it by accident." Kuroko mimed the smashing of the hoop into his joint. "The sorcerer must have panicked and fed more power to speed up the healing process. Since the mark was made in the sorcerer's blood, I could smell it once it was activated. The scent was too faint before then."

"So that's how."

"Yes."

Aomine hummed and tapped the now-clean flat of his knife against his leg. The rush was still charged and alive in his system. "Then… the sorcerer was watching nearby? Is he still?"

To his disappointment, Kuroko shook his head. "He's nowhere in the vicinity. However… Aomine-kun, may I borrow that?"

He handed the knife over and only asked, "What for?" after the fact.

"Thank you." Kuroko handled the knife with a deft touch, flipping it in the air, and then all Aomine caught was the faintest blur of movement followed immediately by the scrape of steel on concrete. The sounds that tumbled afterward included the thud of the knife falling to the ground by the wall, and the high-pitched squeals of the bat familiar impaled upon it.

"Oh." The bat's chittering grew feeble as Aomine approached to retrieve his knife. He picked the body up gingerly and brought it under the lamplight, but he sure as hell couldn't discern any magical residue that might be clinging to it. Momoi might be able to tell if she didn't throw the carcass back at him in disgust. "I don't suppose you can sniff anything out on this thing?" 

No answer.

"Kuroko?" He glanced over, half expecting the vampire to have vanished again, but he was still there. Not looking so good, however. His eyelids were fluttering shut and his breathing was heavy, entire body shaking like a leaf.

Before Aomine could say another word, the vampire dropped to the ground in a heap.


	2. a friend in need is a friend indeed

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> In which phone calls are made, blood is shed, and identities are uncovered.

That night, everything changed.

Summer was sneaking around the corner early and already the A/C was turned on too high, humming through the vents and plunging Momoi's room into arctic levels of cold. She ignored the discomfort, even though her bare arms and legs prickled in gooseflesh, and the damp mass of her just-washed hair was beginning to soak through the towel covering her shoulders.

Instead she was rigidly still, not even shivering, seated on the edge of her bed with her phone in hand. Another minute passed, and another digit changed on the clock. Her lips thinned imperceptibly. With sharp, decisive movements, she punched in the keys to pull up a menu.

     Delete image?  
      **»Yes**  
      »Cancel

Momoi's thumb hovered over the pad for just a second before ending it with one swift stroke. Image deleted. Her wallpaper of Nakayama Hiroshi (age 15, class 1-B, best subject: history) disappeared into the ether.

She let out the breath she'd been holding, then set to work erasing his phone number and all of the texts they'd exchanged, one by one. The process, once begun, was clinically methodical, done without the fevered hurry of a grudge and without the reluctant pause of regret. An icy bead of water slid down her neck but not even a hint of tears shimmered in her half-closed eyes.

     Delete message?  
      **»Yes**  
      »Cancel

     Delete message?  
      **»Yes**  
      »Cancel

     Delete message?  
      **»Yes**  
      »Cancel

On and on she went until it her inbox was purged. Momoi finally closed her phone and set it aside on the bed. She interlaced her fingers and stretched her arms out, then rolled the tension out of her shoulders. That hadn't been so bad. They hadn't been dating for very long, anyway, only since a little before the school year started. They weren't in the same class, but they attended the same cram school. That shouldn't make things too awkward. Boys came and went, it wasn't unusual. The tiresome part was how they often left after making the same preposterous demand: "him or me?"

Momoi frowned and toweled her hair vigorously. If only Aomine wasn't such a handful, maybe she'd have a more successful high school love life. " _Boys_ ," she sighed, folding the towel and draping it over the back of a chair. She'd sworn off the insecure ones who couldn't handle the fact her childhood friend happened to be male, and an irritating, immature, hopeless jerk at that. The 10-year association came with a hefty amount of baggage she'd been forced to lug around all throughout her school life, and certain explanations had become staples of her conversation. No, they weren't dating, they'd never dated, and they never would. No, she wasn't getting rid of him anytime soon, and even if she wanted to she wasn't going to choose her friends or the people she spent time with based on someone else's orders.

Nakayama had seemed different. Accepting, or so she'd assumed.

"'Different' was right," she said under her breath, dragging a brush through her hair.

Nakayama hadn't fussed or blustered over anything. He'd just gone out and found someone else to see on the side. He hadn't denied it, either. Hadn't even been the least bit embarrassed or ashamed when she confronted him right then and there, caught in the act.

Momoi yanked harder than necessary on a tangle caught in the brush bristles, working the knot out with several insistent tugs that sent twinges of pain through her scalp. "Good riddance!" she declared when the strands came free, flicking them wetly over her shoulder to start brushing the other side.

She had just plugged in the hairdryer when her ringtone burst into the chorus of Arashi's latest chart topper. Checking the ID made her face darken, but even though he was the next-to-last person she wanted to talk to it was rare for him to call.

"Hello," she answered at the last moment before it went to voicemail. "If you want dinner, you can come get it yourself. We're not a delivery service. You didn't even say you weren't coming!" Not that anyone was surprised. Aomine hadn't shown up to a Momoi family dinner in a long time, the ingrate. Her impossibly kind, all-forgiving mother still made plenty for leftovers.

The other end was strangely silent. Momoi pulled the phone back to make sure the call was still in progress. "Hello, Dai-chan?"

"…Satsuki. Are you home now?"

"Where else would I be at this time of night? Geez, I'm not a delinquent like you."

"Good."

In the long pause that followed Momoi's brows slowly lifted. 'Good'? That was all? No snarky comeback, no demands to be fed? "Dai-chan, are you feeling all right?"

"M'fine," came the curt answer. Very faint in the background she heard the familiar voice of the landlord. Aomine must have just gotten in.

Still holding the phone to her ear, she pulled on a sports jacket over her loungewear. "You're acting weird. I'm coming over."

"Don't. Seriously, just stay home. I don't need you bothering me with your stupid boyfriend crap again."

…Well, it wasn't as if she ever expected a kind word from him. She finished zipping the jacket up to her chin. "You're the one who bothered me first," she pointed out, leaving her room and making her way towards the kitchen where she rifled through the refrigerator for the neatly packaged leftovers.

"I won't answer the door," he told her, and hung up.

"Jerk," she muttered, tucking the containers under her arm. Momoi went to the door and slipped on a pair of shoes. "I'm going to Dai-chan's," she announced.

"Okay, don't be too late, sweetie," said her mother.

Momoi spared herself a moment of resignation; if she'd said she was going to see Nakayama or any other boy at this hour, there would have been a monumental protest. _Stupid Dai-chan_. It was his fault her love life was in constant shambles. Indirectly, maybe, but still. And here she was, bringing him dinner.

She took the elevator down to the ground floor and marched over to the apartment where Aomine lived, just him and his dad. They'd moved in when she was four. He never remembered having a mother, nor did he know of any other relatives. Momoi probably had Aomine to thank for the honing of her investigative skills, not that he'd be happy to know it. When she'd posed the idea of locating his mother, he'd given her his most furious glare and growled, "Don't do such stupid things, Satsuki."

She'd done it anyway for her own curiosity's sake, and maybe a little out of spite. Her efforts had uncovered an address in Nakasu, Fukuoka, telling her all she didn't need to know. Ever since Momoi had kept the knowledge guiltily close like a spot of tarnish on her heart that wouldn't be rubbed out.

Her first knock on the door went unanswered, as expected. Unperturbed, Momoi fished out the spare key that had been entrusted to her family. Aomine's father wasn't home often, sometimes for long stretches of time, but he was a kind man who cared about his son even if he didn't have the slightest clue how to handle him and thus never tried. 

The key turned and she let herself in. The apartment was dark, and habit was the only thing that prevented her from tripping over the shoes messily piled in the genkan. She sidestepped them and flipped the switch for the lights.

"Satsuki…?" Aomine's voice was spiked with uncertainty coming from somewhere down the hall.

"I let myself in~" She picked her way to the small kitchenette, peeling the lids off her containers and sticking them in the mircrowave.

"What the hell? I'm telling you to get lost!"

"I brought food, you should be grateful!" She crossed her arms and glared at nothing in particular while the microwave hummed.

The place was always at least a little cluttered by virtue of housing two unchecked men, but while Aomine had no problem loitering alone at school, he seemed to dislike doing the same in an empty home, so the mess wasn't as bad as it could have been. There were clean dishes in the drying rack, though a plate of crumbs and a coffee mug had been left out on the table for God knows how long. Momoi relocated them to the sink. She also picked up the Touou blazer and tie that had been unceremoniously dropped on the floor. The dark fabric was rough with grit and dusty with dirt, much more so than what usually accumulated when Aomine slept outside. _I don't want to know_. Momoi grimaced and tried to pat some of the dirt out of the cloth, encountering grass stains and a rip in one cuff.

She pitched her voice in annoyance. "What did you do? Don't tell me you got… into a… fight…?" She rubbed her fingers together, pulling them away sticky and smeared with red. Her hand on the blazer shook, then fisted tightly in the abused fabric before throwing it over the nearest chair. 

The bathroom door at the end of the hallway was slightly ajar, swinging open with a single push that almost hit Aomine inside where he leaned against the sink. His shirt was crumpled at his feet, white and scarlet-stained, with more blood gleaming against the brown tone of his shoulder.

"Geez, Satsuki, learn how to knock." His expression in the mirror was irritated. A number of cuts and scrapes had torn up his face, and a dark bruise swelled along his cheekbone. It wasn't pretty, but it wasn't the worst he'd suffered. The wound at the base of his neck—still bleeding sluggishly—that was the sight that made Momoi's stomach flip.

She fumbled for her phone.

Fingers clamped around her wrist, tight enough to hurt. "I said I'm fine!"

"The hell you are!" Shock and horror froze the path of her stare, unable to look away from the injury. Throughout his life Aomine had shrugged off his share of skinned knees, sprained ankles, black eyes, and on one occasion two broken fingers courtesy of Momoi and a slammed door. But this—had he been _stabbed?_ There was a puncture—a set of them—a cluster of furrowed holes gouged into his flesh…

"Satsuki, don't you _dare_ say a word to anyone. If you do I'm walking away right the fuck now."

Her mouth opened and closed. She finally ripped her gaze away from his shoulder, swung it down to where his hand was cutting off her circulation and rested on the abrasions that scuffed his knuckles. Her nerves rippled, a rising tide cresting with an outburst. "You—you _idiot!_ "

He twisted her phone out of her trembling grasp, using one hand to pop the back and dig the battery out before putting it in his pocket. She fumed uselessly. Aomine cocked a brow, mouth twisting without humor. "Promise not to tell?"

"You son of a—fine!"

He let her go. She rubbed her wrist. There wasn't anything stopping her from telling her parents _later_ … if she could stomach the sight of Aomine turning his back on her. _Later_ , Momoi promised herself. _Right now, prioritize._ She took a deep, steadying breath. "Do you even have disinfectant in your mancave here?" There was a first-aid kit lying open on the toilet (lid closed for once) that contained rolls of bandages, gauze pads, tape…

Aomine flourished a square packet of antiseptic wipes between his fingers. Deadpan, he said, "I was gonna do it all badass like in the movies, but no one would sell hard liquor to a high school student."

Momoi snatched the packet from him with a sniff. "Of course they wouldn't." She swept the first-aid kit away and pointed to the seat. "Sit."

When his shoulder was comfortably below eye level she leaned in—only to pause and shove her hair out of the way, tying it in a loose knot at the base of her neck for lack of a hair tie. The look on Aomine's face was disinterested, even bored, but his body was still tense, a far cry from his typical lazy sprawl.

She dragged her eyes to the wound and bit her lip, but upon further inspection it wasn't too terribly bad. Probably. Four holes were punched into the skin, not cleanly, but enough to put a picture in her mind: the imprint of teeth marks left in a dog's chew toy.

"What?" Aomine asked when Momoi started to back away.

"You don't have rabies now, do you?"

" _What?_ " But then the look on Aomine's face shuttered. He glanced away. "Just clean this up, will you?"

"You should get a doctor to do this," she huffed, but returned with a damp hand towel. There was a flinch when the cloth touched down on his skin, sopping up the blood and turning the towel redder by the second. He let her work in silence, gritting his teeth when a stinging antiseptic wipe passed over the open wound. After getting most of the mess out of the way, Momoi scrutinized the holes again. They were too close together for a dog, weren't they?

"Hey. Now's not the time to space out, stupid."

"Hmph." Momoi covered the clean area with a gauze pad and taped it down. That would have to do. She reached for the first-aid kit to straighten up, but made a detour to wash her hands at the sink first. The water turned pink as it gurgled down the drain. "Are you at least going to tell me what happened?"

Aomine peered down at the dressing and gave his shoulder an experimental shrug, wincing as he did so. At first Momoi thought his silence was his answer, but then he spoke up with a baffling non sequitur: "Did you notice anything weird about that Yama-whatever bastard you dated?"

"Eh? You mean Nakayama?"

"So it was Nakayama…"

Momoi slapped his good shoulder.

"Ow! I'm injured here!" His hands went up to ward off more blows as they rained down on him.

"Dai-chan! Did you actually pick a fight with him? I told you, people will get the wrong idea! Stupid, stupid, stupid…!"

"Satsuki—hey—quit it—!"

"It was bad enough in junior high, but I held it in and bore it until now! I'll never have a normal high school romance because of you, you life ruiner!"

"How am I…? Look, he was an asshole anyway! You're better off without him and all that other comforting shit."

Momoi halted her assault to hiccup and blink through a sudden blur of tears. Oh, dear. She dabbed at her eyes and sniffed through her running nose, feeling watery all over. "W-well, that's true, but…"

"Ah, geez." Aomine yanked a wad of toilet paper free and shoved it at her. 

"Thank you…" 

"Your crying face is hideous, that's all."

She threw her snot-laden tissues at him. 

"But honestly," she said a moment later, packing up the first-aid kit, "what were you thinking? The Inter-High is coming up, you can't go getting into fights now!"

"Whatever. Not like he's going to tattle."

Momoi slammed the lid closed so she could hold her head in her hands. "Just how badly did you beat him up? Don't tell me he's in the hospital with his jaw wired shut..." And did Nakayama have a dog? She'd never been to his house before. He didn't seem like the type to keep pets, though.

"Nah, nothing like that." Aomine leaned back, his face tipped toward the ceiling with his eyes squinted at the light overhead. "Actually, I think I killed him."

"Uh-huh. Where did you hide the body?"

"Didn't have to. He sort of..." Aomine waved his hand in a vague motion. "…went poof."

Momoi tugged her hair free of its knot just so she could have something to yank on. "Dai-chan, I'm serious, you'll get in trouble for fighting."

"I'm being serious, too. I'm telling you, he was nothing but dust! I probably have bits of him _on me_." His head jerked down to give his body a suspicious once-over.

She did the same, wrinkling her nose at the dirt and grime still clinging to him, not to mention more traces of blood. "Are you trying to say Nakayama turned to dust like—like a vampire? After you, what, staked him in the heart?" She laughed a little, but it was a thin, fragile sound, and Aomine was no good at handling fragile things. Her amusement went to pieces when she saw the way he looked at her; intent and with an almost fevered brightness in his eyes, close to the excitement that had once shone on his face when he played basketball, but the smile was all wrong, lips stretched in parody rather than joy.

"Yeah, Satsuki. That's what I'm saying."

#

In the dead of night, the cheery tune of her ringtone pierced through the darkness of sleep and jarred Momoi awake. Her hand shot out in confusion, and she slapped her alarm in reflex before fumbling for the correct device, dragging her phone under the covers with her in a vain attempt to muffle its noise. Her housemates wouldn't appreciate being woken up any more than she did. Bleary eyes squinted at the bright glow of the display, slowly recognizing the characters on the screen with a wretched moan. Who else would call her at—Momoi checked the clock—three in the morning?

"Dai-chan," she grumbled, curled on her side with her phone to her ear in hopes that she would be able to drift back to sleep soon. "If you're not dead or dying, can't it wait until morning?"

"Yo, Satsuki. Are your housemates home right now?" 

"If they are, they're sleeping. Like I was until you called." She complained but sank into relief all the same. He certainly didn't sound like he was on death's door.

"Then I'm coming over."

Momoi froze in mid-yawn. "Ah?! Wait a minute, why—"

"Dead or dying."

" _What_ —"

"Not me, someone else."

"Dai-chan!" She sat bolt upright, throwing her covers off.

"Oh, and you'll need to spot me for the cab fare. See you."

"Wait a minute, explain—" But her shriek was met with a click followed by insufferable silence.

#

As luck would have it, all three of Momoi's housemates were away that night. One, she remembered, was visiting her parents in the country. Another had gone out with her boyfriend and hadn't returned. That left one more unaccounted for, but by this hour it was unlikely she would return before morning. She texted Aomine that the coast was clear, and also asked what he needed from her although it would be a minor miracle if he bothered to reply. Besides, if his problem was that easy to solve she'd still be sleeping.

So all Momoi could do in preparation was collect her spellbooks and check on her supplies. There were candles of all colors, sticks of chalk, a box of assorted gemstones, harpy feathers by the handful even after she'd sold or traded several bundles of them, and outside a small garden flourished with a wide variety of plants and herbs. The rarest and most specialized items she kept under lock and key: armored scales shed from a wyvern's back, fragrant wood shavings from a dryad's tree, and locks of sinewy mermaid hair. Some were trophies Aomine exchanged for a price, others were bought or bartered. 

She also kept a well-stocked drawer of mundane first-aid supplies, though Aomine was like a cat with his injuries; you never noticed until they were so bad he couldn't fake it anymore, and then he growled and sulked when you did. 

"Forget anthropology, I might as well get a degree in veterinarian medicine," Momoi sighed to herself. "Surely it would pay better than smalltime witchcraft."

Magic, it turned out, was very much a family affair. She had but a drop of it in her blood, and extensive research traced that drop generations back to an ancestor from a respectable line of sorcerers. Unfortunately, marrying into the nondescript, utterly unmagical Momoi family hadn't been considered very respectable by the clan, and they cut ties with that ancestor. Time hadn't made them any more forgiving, and even though she'd tracked them down they had refused to teach her.

But Momoi had her own resources, so she learned the basics by herself. And she found one other sorcerer who would at least give her the time of day, maybe even a hand if the stars aligned just right. Then there was Aomine, whose infamous exploits did wonders for her spell stock (even if he was totally mercenary about it).

She frowned, chin in her hands as she sat and waited at the table where she'd spread out her books. Aomine was bringing someone to her, someone who couldn't go to the hospital or the police. It wouldn't be the first time a bystander had been hurt, but usually it was enough to make sure they'd get help from a professional, preventing further involvement. There had been that one time with Kise—but, well, that had been an anomaly to begin with.

"Dai-chan, what have you gotten into this time?"

#

"You owe me money, don't forget."

"Yeah, yeah…"

Momoi held the door open while Aomine carried a body inside. A living body, she assumed, and at least there wasn't any blood. Her critical eye didn't pick up any grievous injuries on Aomine, either. There wasn't any disturbance in his demeanor, his expression as disgruntled as ever, and he put down his burden on the couch without being directed.

It was a boy—still breathing now that she could see the slight rise and fall of his chest. He showed no outward sign of having been hurt, but there was a definite pallor about his face. No fever, his forehead was dry and cool to the touch, but his pulse was weak.

Perplexed, Momoi sat back and narrowed her eyes at Aomine, who had helped himself to a glass of water from the kitchen. "What happened?"

"Beats me. He just showed up out of nowhere, there was a homunculus, I killed it, and Kuroko fainted."

Momoi began to massage her temples. "Okay. One thing at a time. This kid's name is Kuroko? Do you know him?" While she had no interest in monitoring Aomine's social life, he tended to be a loner, so springing a stranger on her like this was odd. He was acquainted with a few of the guild hunters, maybe that was the connection. Kuroko didn't look much like a hunter, but then again, neither did Sakurai.

"Not really. Like I said, he just showed up."

Innocent bystander, then. Momoi spared Kuroko a pitying look before leveling her attention on Aomine again. "So he was involved by mistake."

"Well…"

"Dai-chan, this isn't helping!"

"Geez, you're annoying!" He fell back into a chair and crossed his arms, glaring. "He appeared, then the monster appeared. He helped me get rid of it, so I don't think they were on the same side. And also…" His attention drifted sideways in thought. "…The homunculus was definitely after me, not him. So him being there was coincidence, I think."

Someone had sent something as powerful as homunculus after Aomine, but knowing how he was Momoi couldn't be surprised. _As if he doesn't have enough enemies…_ "I can't believe you even know what a homunculus is."

Aomine looked like he wanted to take offense, but knew she was right. He grumbled, "Kuroko told me."

"I see. A very helpful guy, this Kuroko. Is he with the guild, do you think?" Or maybe he was a sorcerer. Momoi perked at the thought of having a fellow magic-user indebted to her.

Aomine let out a snort. "I doubt that."

"Eh, why? Stop withholding information when you know I need it!"

He didn't snap at her this time, but the look he was pointedly not aiming at her didn't make her feel the slightest bit better. With an exaggerated, stalling roll of his shoulders, he finally said, "Well, the guild would probably just stake him first."

Normally lightning-quick on the uptake, the sheer absurdity of that implication took several seconds for Momoi to process. The guild hunters… stake…

She shot to her feet, flung out an arm to point at the—the _thing_ lying on her couch, and hissed, "Dai-chan, did you bring a _vampire_ into my house?"

"Kinda, yeah."

Momoi snatched the nearest throw cushion to fling at Aomine's head. "Why would you rescue a vampire?!"

He caught the cushion and used it as a shield to block further projectiles. Coasters, manga, and a bag of gummies bounced onto the floor. "Hey! Chill out, Satsuki, I said he helped!"

"But… but…!" Vampires blended well among humans—she should know, she dated one for a while. There was no telling whether the salaryman on the train or the old woman at the market was having a little type O for dinner that night. "You could have warned me!"

"Sorry, sorry."

She didn't approach the couch again, but she did put down her ammunition. "Of all the thoughtless—you owe me an explanation."

"What, again? I already told you—"

"But why? Out of the goodness of your heart? What _happened?_ "

Aomine scratched the back of his head. "Nothing special, I mean… I don't know. It was… interesting… I guess." He caught the glare Momoi was giving him and growled defensively, "I just felt like it, okay? I've been crazy bored!"

A bored Aomine was a dangerous Aomine. She knew that. He went looking for trouble in all the strangest places. Come to think of it—that was how they got into this entire mess in the first place with her cheating ex. Momoi heaved a sigh. She might as well batter herself against a brick wall for all the good yelling at Aomine did. "Fine. Picking up stray vampires is your new hobby."

"Hey, that's a little…"

"But what am I supposed to do about it?"

Aomine slumped back in the chair and pulled the pillow over his face. His muffled voice came from behind it: "Man, why did I even come to you?"

_Exactly what I'm wondering!_ She looked from her childhood friend to the vampire passed out on her couch. A hunter helping a vampire was just… but Aomine said Kuroko had helped him first. Weirder and weirder. Momoi propped her fist under her chin and ran through her mental bank of information.

There were historical records of vampires working together with humans. Whether they were inherently evil or not was much debated, but they most definitely had a penchant for feeding on humans which put the two at odds more often than not. She supposed she could take Aomine's story at face value. Maybe.

"Dai-chan, can you promise he's safe?"

"Are you kidding? No way." He looked out from behind the pillow with a healthy amount of caution, prepared for another barrage. Momoi made a valiant effort to resist, in part because the only thing within reach was a lamp that she'd rather not have to replace and then explain to her housemates. "But come on, Satsuki, I could take him if it came to that."

_Ah_ , she thought. That would be what people meant when they said Aomine was terrifying as an opponent, but reliable when he was on your side. "I guess you wouldn't let me be murdered in my own home…"

He waved a careless hand. "Yeah, that would be too troublesome."

She puffed her cheeks in annoyance but it was no use getting upset over every little thing that came out of Aomine's mouth. "…Anyway. You're saying he just passed out after the fight? He seemed fine before it, and nothing unusual happened?"

"Yeah, I guess. Relatively speaking."

"Then… wouldn't you come to the logical conclusion?"

He simply stared at her.

_Oh, for…_ "Blood, Ahomine, he needs blood!"

"Oh, is that all?"

She hunkered down by the couch to peer at the vampire, not too close, but close enough to confirm there was no change in his condition, neither for the better nor the worse. "Well, I'm no expert, but it's their one and only basic need in life. They can survive without it longer than we can survive without food or water, but eventually they'll starve. …You did read the notes I gave you, didn't you? The ones I made _especially_ for you?"

"Eh, I have them… somewhere…"

Momoi sighed. 

"What? It's not like there was a test."

"No, just your life on the line." The saddest part was her complete lack of surprise. "Never mind, then. That's my amateur diagnosis. Take it or leave it."

"Blood, huh? Seems easy enough…" The look on his face wasn't thoughtful so much as already decided.

"Just so you know," she began, going to the table to collect her books and stacking them on top of one another with more force than was strictly necessary. The beginner spellbooks were on the thin side, but the encyclopedias and guides and history texts made heavy, satisfying thumps. "I don't approve. If you must, I'd rather you rob a blood bank, but that would be too much trouble, wouldn't it?" Her fingers clenched on top of Whitaker's _Origins of Sorcery (Fourth Edition)_.

"Basically, yeah."

Her shoulders sagged in defeat. "I guess I can't stop you."

"…Ah, one more thing, Satsuki." He took her wrist and flipped her palm up. Then he placed something small, soft, and just a little bit bloody in her waiting hand. "Find out where this came from, would you?"

Not knowing what to expect save for that it couldn't be anything good, Momoi looked down at the dubious gift. An inch-long, red-rimmed gash opened up its belly, and she could see the pink of her skin clear through the wound. The bat was very stiff, very cold, and very much expired. For the second time that night, an enraged shriek pierced through the (fortuitously) empty house.

#

Click, swish.

Out popped the blade, wobbling slightly as it balanced in Aomine's loose hold. He sat half-curled in the chair with his arm propped up on his knee, regarding the knife's edge with a scrutinizing eye. It was sharp enough, to be sure, and it didn't look like there was any bit of gooey homunculus flesh clinging to it. Good enough, right?

He glanced at Momoi's closed door, almost expecting her to come out screeching at him to at least pretend to care about sanitization, because what was he going to do if he got infected with a zombie virus, or gangrene?

But the door remained shut, the line of light visible beneath it never wavering. She'd taken the bat (after dropping it on the floor, washing her hands, and putting on dishwashing gloves before picking it up again) into her room for whatever witchcraft needed to be worked on the thing. "There's no way I can concentrate with you around," she'd grumbled. He'd sniped back about her lack of talent to begin with. The door had slammed with enough force to shake the picture frames on the walls.

Aomine clicked his tongue, folded the knife closed, and shifted to plant both feet on the floor again. Would Momoi be more or less ticked off if he used one of her kitchen knives? Heat sterilized, didn't it? Or… was that cauterize? Never mind, not like he had a fire on hand anyway. No alcohol, either—some stupid house rule about some of its occupants being underage.

So he was back to square one.

Click, swish.

Aomine dragged himself out of the chair to stand beside the couch. Kuroko continued to lie there, unresponsive, which was kind of impressive considering all the commotion that had flown over his head (literally, even). "Boring," Aomine muttered, but even as he said it the muscles in his face twitched and lifted minutely to one side in a brief smirk. He'd had worse nights.

The house Momoi shared with her roommates was well-furnished, and the couch big enough for Aomine to claim an edge of a seat with Kuroko stretched out along its length. The vampire's body was cold—not quite corpse cold, and he lifted a limp arm to check on its mobility: still flexible. He was pretty sure the consensus was that vampires were not undead, reanimated corpses with the souls of demons or what-have-you. Momoi would know for certain. All Aomine cared about was how to dust 'em. Though there were, apparently, exceptions.

He stretched out his arm, first considering the veins in the crook where blood was normally drawn by doctors, then trailing down to the more accessible bluish line in his wrist. The edge of his knife was placed against the skin. Aomine spared a moment to search his memory and figure that no, at the very least, he shouldn't be at risk of zombie infection.

Steel sliced across the street, not down the road, stinging about as much as he expected. He didn't think the cut was that deep—he wasn't trying to remove any extremities here—but the line of red that welled up soon spilled over in a dribbling trickle along his arm. He straightened the limb, angled it down, and the streams ran backwards, pooling in his palm, dripping through his fingers before he could even think of stopping it.

"Oh, shit." He followed the falling drops with a cringe at the thought of Momoi's wrath, but by some stroke of luck they didn't stain the upholstery. Instead, a small, crimson spatter took shape on the pale curve of Kuroko's cheek. "…Oops."

Awkward maneuvering managed to get Aomine's hand positioned so the blood dripped over the vampire's mouth at least. No reaction at first, and the blood collected upon the seam of his lips, which then parted slightly to allow the puddle to seep through. The tip of his tongue sought out the residue escaping from the corner. His eyes remained closed, but the sound of his breathing got louder by a tiny margin, its note just a hint frenetic.

"Huh," Aomine said to himself as more blood dripped down and was sipped up, bit by bit. It was sort of like that time Momoi had tried to raise a familiar—a small bird hatched by her magic, which she'd fed with an eyedropper until it grew enough to shriek and peck at her incessantly, crap everywhere, and get into a dogfight with a local pigeon which had ended badly for everyone involved.

…Okay, maybe this wasn't like that at all.

He'd stopped paying attention, so his reflex was to jerk away when he felt something brush against his fingers. Kuroko's half-raised hand drifted down again to rest upon his chest, rising and falling in heavy, labored breaths. He was awake now, watching Aomine with his unreadable expression and red-stained mouth.

"Uh. How're you doing?" Aomine squelched the urge to hide his arm behind his back, not so much out of guilt, and neither did Kuroko look particularly grateful, but…

The vampire's eyes were trained on his bleeding wrist. Aomine thought maybe if he moved it back and forth, that gaze would follow the movement like a cat being teased. Then, abruptly, Kuroko's attention swung away with a turn of his head, lips pressed tightly together. "…Thank you," he spoke after a long, strained pause.

Aomine leaned over to get a better view of Kuroko's profile, but still the vampire wouldn't face him. The splash of blood upon his cheek was on vivid display as if being purposefully ignored, the same way he purposefully refrained from wiping his mouth. "Hey," Aomine said, armed braced on the back of the couch. The bleeding was slowing, but the gradual accumulation would drip again soon. "You still don't look too good."

"You've done enough, Aomine-kun."

"Are you mad or something?"

"No. Of course not."

"Then…" He stuck his wrist right under Kuroko's nose, making him stiffen, eyes widening. "Come on. You're feeling ravenous now, right? Because I woke the beast."

"…I'm not going to attack you. Or anyone else here."

"That's a given." He continued to hold his wrist out. The wound ached, slicked and shiny with bright red.

Aomine's offer stretched thin in the space between them, narrowing down to almost nothing by the time acceptance finally tugged on Aomine's fingers. Kuroko guided his wrist closer, lids of his eyes shuttering half-closed. 

"Itadakimasu." Very carefully, he pressed the flat of his tongue to the wet skin surrounding the cut, light pressure gliding across it. The trademark teeth came out, pointed canines growing sharp and long with hunger, but they didn't pierce the flesh.

Aomine had been bitten before—fighty vampires also got bitey in his experience—and he'd seen the way they preferred to feed. The fangs were no joke; they were meant to rip and tear to make the blood flow freely, to get at the deeply hidden veins and arteries. Aomine didn't need book learning to know vampires were primal creatures, not wine-sipping connoisseurs. Modern times might have forced them to use more discretion, to take a little here and there just to avoid notice, but when they got carried away their victims were never neatly dead with a set of picturesque holes bleeding daintily from the neck.

Twin fangs indented Aomine's skin, stopping short of breaking it. Kuroko's mouth was sealed over Aomine's wrist, his feeding limited to licking and sucking with weirdly polite effort. Not that Aomine wanted to be gouged, either, and every time the deadly tips of those teeth grazed him a thread of electricity flickered to life throughout his system. It wasn't quite a shot of adrenaline, but close, body memory knowing the feel of those teeth and what they could do.

Yet Kuroko refused to do it, and refrained from prodding and aggravating the wound more than necessary. He drank what dribbled out, followed the trails that wound a little ways down Aomine's arm, then came back up to lap at the palm of his hand, even cleaning up the tiny rivulets between his fingers.

Aomine watched all of this with gross fascination. The soft, warm, wet mouth painted gruesome, the contrast of color around it. Kuroko's pallor had retreated a bit, still on the pale side but less outright sickly. His breathing wasn't as labored. His pupils were dilated, but after one last swipe of his tongue across the scarlet line on Aomine's wrist he pushed away.

"Gochisousama deshita."

And that was that. Aomine's arm dropped limp to his side at last, sticky but no longer streaked crimson. The blood had looked showy, but the amount hadn't been that much; he doubted it was enough to count as a meal for a vampire, but Kuroko seemed better off already. He sat up, scrubbing the remnants of his feeding from his face. Before Aomine could point him towards the bathroom to wash up, Kuroko was already getting to his feet.

"Thank you again," he said, ending with a polite bow.

"No big deal. In fact, doesn't this make us even?"

"Aomine-kun would have found the mark eventually."

Well, _yeah_ , but… "Whatever. Call it even."

"Okay. Then, I'll be going now."

"At this time of night? And…" _…where?_ he almost added, instead turning the pause into a clean break and throwing the loose end away.

"It will be dawn soon. And I don't think this is somewhere I should stay."

"Ah, yeah. Satsuki doesn't even let me crash here, most of the time." Though, that may have had something to do with his tendency to arrive with difficult-to-explain injuries. He made the effort to call ahead this time, Momoi should be grateful, and maybe this once he could at least catch a little bit sleep on the couch before her roommates returned and the place got noisy. He wasn't bleeding—well, much, anymore. Aomine glanced out the window where it was still dark out, but not for long, perhaps an hour or two. "Are you the type that can't handle sun?"

"I don't burst into flames or anything like that." There was a mild hint of reproach in the answer and Aomine had to grin; he had yet to see anything like that happen when a vampire was exposed to sunlight. There was usually some kind of effect, though, and Kuroko admitted, "But I do feel tired during the day, so I'd prefer to take my leave before then."

"It's not like I'm your jailer…" He searched, but came up with little else to say. Aomine jerked his thumb over his shoulder. "Door's that way."

Kuroko's gaze lingered on him for a moment before he inclined his head. "It was nice meeting you. Take care."

"You, too. Don't find yourself on the wrong end of a stake."

A blink of surprise, followed by a soft smile. "I'll try not to."

#

The spell was one of the few she was skilled at—investigation was her specialty, after all, whether her means were magical or not. Momoi's talent wasn't so great that she could claim the title of sorceress, but when it counted her witchcraft could be a useful aid.

She preferred using a mirror rather than a bowl of water—a plain square of glass normally propped up on her desk, nothing fancy. Water, she thought, tended to dilute the spell, which was just silly when clarity and accuracy was the whole point. The flat mirror served as a plate upon which she added a drop of clear, glistening liquid. Though solid, the glass surface appeared to ripple when the dew collected from a fairy's wing was added, and the reflections in the mirror sharpened. There were many bases for seeing spells, but this was her favorite since it was easy to find fairies in a witch's garden, and she grew plenty of foxglove and primrose for that purpose.

Next, she reached into her box of gemstones, thinking of vision and clarity, and picked up whichever stone fell into her grasp first. What came up was a chunk of rough opal, light in body tone, showing yellow, green, and pink fire. Not bad, opals were unpredictable in nature and so were visions. It was a fitting choice. Momoi placed the stone near the edge of the mirror, which took on the opal's pale, speckled light.

For good measure she sprinkled fresh violet and crocus petals across the mirror. Redundancy never hurt when it came to magic. Then she was ready for the focus of the spell, and her least favorite part. 

Nose scrunched in distaste, she used tweezers to dig into the rigid bat carcass where it had been conveniently cut open already. Blood was what she needed, but its heart had stopped pumping hours ago. Her tweezers tugged at its innards, pulling out some red pulp and dumping it with a tiny splat on the mirror's pristine surface, reminding Momoi how magic was not all wonders and light.

"Yuck," she grimaced, shoving the bat into a plastic bag to dispose of later.

The components were in place, now for the incantation to shape the magic. She had the words memorized already—it was a short, simple spell, and one she'd used before—but she would read from the page of her book just in case. Most of her texts were translated into Japanese, and that was another point of debate among sorcerers. Momoi wasn't sure which was more important: using the spell's original language or the castor's native tongue, but her English wasn't good enough for anything but the second option.

"I humbly beg your guidance," she began. These were her own words, not the incantation proper, because it was always wise to show respect for the forces one was about to invoke. "I present myself to you in service if you would grant my wish."

Flux and flow; magic depended on castors to use it as the castors depended on magic to achieve results. The relationship was give and take, cycling endlessly much the same way the world kept turning. Stagnation was anathema to sorcerers, and Momoi found that she got cranky and restless if she went too long without casting even in practice. Maybe it was a bit like a drug, but it was carefully moderated and controlled. There were rules to be upheld, certain acts that were forbidden, and those whose job was to enforce and punish in the name of those laws.

Momoi breathed in and swept the wayward concerns from her mind. The flower petals gave off a faint scent, undercut by the sickly-sweet aroma of bat blood, grounding her focus in the spell at hand. Her eyes landed upon the page of her book.

"Power acknowledges power; you, who has found your way to me. Through power in blood, and bone, and will, you have arrived, and I would seek you in return. If you have come to me in truth, reveal to me your sign."

The light of the mirror brightened, shimmering with opal fire and creating an aurora across the glass surface while the flower petals scattered with a burst of fragrance. The lumpy bit taken from the bat familiar liquefied, blood darkening nearly black, trickling and rolling outward to form the shape of a sorcerer's mark.

As far as spells went, all this did was reveal another sorcerer's brand of family magic. It wasn't more discerning than that, but if she at least had a family mark she could get a general direction to start with. She had a whole book containing nothing but family crests throughout history, and how to interpret their symbols, which was how she found her ancestor's. Her own sign had changed, though, since her ancestor's family had refused to acknowledge her. No sorcerer, or even minor witch, apparently, could work magic without a crest. The one she possessed now was unique and hers alone.

The crest now painted upon the mirror, light fading to leave only a crust of dried blood, was one Momoi recognized. It was as unique as her own, maybe more so, all sharp, angular lines containing incredible detail—to the point of being a work of art. The foundation of the crest was formed by two interlocked symbols: red and gold.

Momoi's chair squeaked as she rolled back from her desk. Her mouth started to open, but she shut it firmly, not daring to voice the words. _What does he want with Dai-chan this time?_

She glanced around her room as if expecting to find another familiar hiding in a corner, behind her schoolbooks or in the nook of her closet. _No,_ she shook her head, _he wouldn't get caught unless he allowed it._ Trembling, she snatched up the mirror, and with the heel of her hand she scrubbed furiously at the glass, flaking the blood away. Tiny bits of residue remained, and those she picked off with her nails until every last trace of the sign was gone.


End file.
